WhatsApp vs. Skype vs. Viber – Spoiled for Choice

There are many clients available for instant messaging and making VoIP calls through the desktop or through mobile phones. Chatting has now left the PC and entered the mobile world in a very big way.

Messaging apps offer additional features, such as making voice and video calls as well. You can even send and receive files, share photos and videos and group conversations through such hangouts. In fact, there are so many apps, such as WhatsApp, Skype and Viber, that the user is spoiled for choice. What makes one better than the other? Let’s see if we can sort it out.

WhatsApp

It is a very popular messaging app for mobile platforms and has more than 200 million users from all over the world. It is available for the Android and iOS phones, as well as for the BlackBerry and Windows Phones. It was recently bought over by Facebook and is also looking towards including audio calls in the near future. Its top features are text chatting, including chatting with groups. It also offers sharing of files, such as photos and videos and location sharing.

WhatsApp is very accessible and simple to use. You don’t have to incur any more SMS charges through your carrier, if your friends also have the app installed on their smartphones. You get a free trial for a year after which you have to pay $1 for a year as subscription. However, at present, you cannot make audio or video calls through this application. In addition, it does not have a presence on PCs and is available only for the mobile platform. It was founded in the year 2009 by two Yahoo employees who created this SMS alternative.

Skype

Skype has the largest user base among all VoIP apps and presently enjoys more than 300 million users from all over the world. It works on the desktop as well as on mobile platforms. The app is a cross platform one and can be installed on the Android and iOS devices, as well as Windows Phone and the BlackBerry. You can also install it on your Windows 8 desktop or a Mac OS X. Skype offers text chatting and instant messaging as well as group chatting. In addition, Skype also offers audio and video calls for free, to all other users who have the app on their devices. You can also make calls to other landlines and other mobile numbers at a very reasonable rate. Skype enables sharing of files, photos and videos as well in addition to a screen-sharing feature.

Skype has become so synonymous with Internet calls that it has gained a verb status. Those who want to make free or cheap international calls generally make use of this app. It has also entered smart TVs and the Xbox One as well as mobile phones. You can have group-chatting with hundreds of users or contacts at the same time. Skype has also introduced the Skype Qik, which can be used for sending short video messages to contacts.

Viber

Viber is a very popular messaging, audio and video calling application with more than 200 million users. It is available for all mobile platforms, such as Android, iOS and Windows Phone as well as BlackBerry devices. It can also be installed on your desktop, Windows 8 or Mac OS X. Viber allows free calls to contacts already having the app. You can access group chatting, audio and video calls as well as share files and access location sharing features. Your phone number is your ID, so you don’t have to create any account or add contacts to the app, which is not the case with Skype. You can also make Viber Out calls to those who do not have the app, and in this case it will be charged to your usual call allowance on your phone.

Microsoft enables Skype and Lync video integration

On December 5, Microsoft announced that it is beginning the rollout of the second piece of Skype-Lync federation by turning on video integration between the two services.

"We're excited to announce that Skype users can now video call their Skype contacts on Lync, and vice versa!" said company officials in a blog post announcing the new capability.

In May 2013, Microsoft officials said they would deliver Skype-Lync federation in two steps. In 2013, Skype and Lync users were able to integrate contacts, presence, instant messaging and audio calling across the two services. At that time, officials said video connectivity between the two would happen until mid-2014.

Earlier this year, Microsoft execs pushed back the due date for Skype-Lync video integration until year-end 2014.When Microsoft announced last month that the company would be changing the name of Lync to "Skype for Business," officials also said that they planned to update Microsoft's Skype clients with H.264 codec support so as to be able to provide video integration between Skype and Lync 2013.

Update: According to a December 5 Office Blogs post, Skype for Windows desktop is getting the Skype-Lync video federation first. Android and iOS Skype releases will get the new capability "in the coming months."

Microsoft also announced a new Skype update for Windows desktop users today. With Skype 7.0, users can now scroll, call, and browse using touch.

Skype 5.1 For iPhoneAnnounced

Skype continues to improve on their iOS offerings by rolling out Skype 5.1 for iPhone (which is a 44MB download), where it will introduce a slew of new features and improvements, where among them include a new press and hold action so that users are able to do away with conversations from recent chats – pretty nifty for those “empty” chats, no? Apart from that, you are also able to perform an edit on a chat message. Sneaky! Apart from that, one is able to tap the “add favorites” link in order to easily fill up your favorites screen with those whom you happen come into contact the most. 

The People list is now capable of matching the desktop better, since there is a spanking new “Skype” filter, while the “online” filter will be able to include users set to online, away and do not disturb. 

These filter settings can be saved too, of course. Microsoft’s Skype intends to continue rolling out additional features to the app, and when the time comes, they will roll them out in order to deliver maximum benefit to the masses. 

Interestingly enough, it was just slightly more than last week that Skype introduced Skype 5.0 for iOS , so it is refreshing to see how fast the next update came about.

Skype overhaul promises improvedcalling, chat sync across devices

Skype has announced a new architectural update with an intent to improve the popular messaging and video call platform in a world with more connected mobile devices. Sharing some details about the changes in a blog post, Skype's Mark Gillet mentions that Skype is now using the cloud to assist clients in delivering chat messages and connecting calls, marking a shift from the p2p nature of the service where a major amount of processing was done on the user's device.

Gillet calls the move to Skype cloud the service's biggest architectural change in 10 years and says that new technologies are helping the company to promote improved battery life and improved connections. "Skype clients continue to evaluate bandwidth, connectivity and firewall settings to select the most appropriate path for the call and continue to connect devices for P2P calls across the Internet so that users get audio and video connections that 'just work'," he states. 

Skype also credits the cloud for enhancing the performance and quality of its core messaging experience. It talks about the ability to receive messages offline and pushing notifications to the Windows Phone 8 mobile client even when the Skype app is not running, and says that the feature will soon be extended to other Skype mobile clients soon. 

However, the major feature that Skype is about to introduce is chat sync, something which has been demanded by a large number of users since the time Skype started focusing on clients for multiple devices. Skype says that it is working to synchronise chat message status across all of the user's devices so the user knows the current status of all of chats on every device that is used to interact with Skype. 

It says the capability will be rolled out across clients over the next few months. Right now if you log-in to Skype's mobile client after being logged in on the desktop one, you receive all messages that you've already read on your desktop on your mobile, which hampers the chat experience in a world where users keep on shuttling between different devices.

Skype also states that it will use its cloud to help preserve the battery of the users' device by enabling the mobile Skype app to stay in "sleep" mode until it's needed by using push notifications. When a user calls another user, the calling app sends the Skype ID and IP address of the parties, as well as the time and date, to the Skype cloud. 

Once a push notification is sent, Skype collects and stores information about the call. It will even sync missed calls information across all the users' devices, The Skype client on Windows 8.1, will offer the ability to answer calls directly from the lock screen with the user's choice of audio, video or a message. Skype also clarified that it uses strong physical, technical and administrative security protections, apart from storing only partial IP addresses, and cryptographically hashing the Skype IDs it stores, to help protect the users' privacy.

Skype refreshes its iPhone app

Skype has updated its iPhone app with a couple of new features and a few fixes in tow. Skype for iPhone version 4.9 now offers the free and unlimited video messaging that Skype rolled out last week. 

Skype users can record a video message for fellow users who are offline. Those videos then appear when your receipient logs into the service. The updated app also has patched up a few items here and there , according to Skype. Photo sharing is now a more reliable process. Audio and video calls should be more stable. And there are the usual unspecified general fixes and improvements. Skype's iPhone app is compatible with the iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch, requires iOS 5 or higher, and is optimized for the longer screen of the iPhone 5.

WhatsApp is in the big leagues with 250M active users

WhatsApp's active user base could be a cause
for worry among some tech companies and
wireless carriers.
The messaging service announced Thursday
that it has more than 250 million active users
-- making it on par with Skype, Facebook
Messenger, and Twitter, according to The Wall
Street Journal.
Twitter's most recent numbers show more than
200 million monthly active users, while
Skype's are 280 million and Facebook
Messenger's aren't reported but its app is
ranked sixth in free apps in Google Play,
according to the Journal.
In the U.S., WhatsApp is ranked first in paid
apps in the iTunes Store and 31st in free apps
in the Google Play Store (the app costs 99
cents for iOS and is free on Android for the first
year, and then costs 99 cents). During the
AllThingsD mobile conference in April,
WhatsApp CEO Jan Koum hinted that the
service had surpassed Twitter's active users.
Besides having millions of users, WhatsApp is
also relaying billions of messages daily . The
service announced last week that it had
reached a new record of handling more than 27
billion messages in a 24-hour period. The
service's record before that was last December
when it handled 18 billion messages in one
day.
Wireless carriers make a big profit on text
messaging, and apps like WhatsApp are eating
into these earnings. Since WhatsApp offers a
free alternative to texting, users don't have to
pay for each message. According to a report
released in April by research firm Informa, text
messaging is on the decline due to chat
applications becoming users' preferred method
of communication.
However, Koum said during the AllThingsD
conference that carriers could easily turn
around and see his business as driving data
adoption. WhatsApp, Koum said, has
participated in a number of carrier partnerships
that further drive adoption and usage, including
local data deals in India and access to a
"roaming pass" with a partner in Hong Kong,
allowing users to travel elsewhere in Asia and
still use WhatsApp without extra fees.